“I appreciate Governor Perry’s responsiveness and acknowledge that this nominee will move forward and that I want – and we all need – him to be successful,” Heinrich said in a statement Tuesday. “But his past statements on eliminating the Department, an unwillingness to commit to the applied energy research and climate science done at our national labs and universities, and the transition team questionnaire that attacked the integrity of climate scientists all signal where the Trump Administration is headed.”

Heinrich noted that tens of thousands of New Mexicans are involved in Department of Energy missions, largely at Sandia National Labs and Los Alamos National Labs.

“With 25,000 New Mexicans contributing to these important Department of Energy missions, we cannot have any doubts about a nominee’s willingness or ability to defend the agency and its work.”

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All week, we look for stories that help New Mexicans better understand what’s happening with water, climate, energy, landscapes and communities around the region. Thursday morning, that news goes out via email.

After a year of high-profile changes in Gov. Susana Martinez's Cabinet, top officials from several of the most important departments in state government now await Senate confirmation hearings. But the secretaries of environment, finance and health are just of a few of the governor's nearly 100 appointees on the agenda.

The state of New Mexico will join a lawsuit against the Trump administration over the president’s declaration of a national emergency to pay for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. California announced last week that it would sue the federal government.

Gov. Susana Martinez left office with low approval ratings, according to Morning Consult.
Meanwhile, both of New Mexico’s U.S. Senators’ approval ratings remained over 40 percent, with a high amount of voters with no opinion. The pollster found Martinez’s approval rating among all registered voters in her final three months in office was just 35 percent, while 49 percent disapproved of the Republican’s job performance.

Despite a lengthy record of safety violations, the University of California will continue its 75-year legacy of running Los Alamos National Laboratory, the U.S. Department of Energy and National Nuclear Security Administration announced Friday. A management partnership that includes the university, research and development nonprofit Battelle Memorial Institute and Texas A&M University, the alma mater of Energy Secretary Rick Perry, will be paid $2.5 billion annually to run Los Alamos, the birthplace of the atomic bomb.

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The state House of Representatives approved a $7 billion budget on Thursday, sending to the Senate a plan for the next fiscal year that would provide nearly half a billion dollars in additional funds for public schools but which Republicans say amounts to an outsize increase in government spending.

Matthew Reichbach is the editor of the NM Political Report. The former founder and editor of the NM Telegram, Matthew was also a co-founder of New Mexico FBIHOP with his brother and one of the original hires at the groundbreaking website the New Mexico Independent. Matthew has covered events such as the Democratic National Convention and Netroots Nation and formerly published, “The Morning Word,” a daily political news summary for NM Telegram and the Santa Fe Reporter.
Matthew has appeared as a panelist for the Society of Professional Journalists’ New Mexico Chapter’s panel on covering New Mexico politics and the legislature.
A native New Mexican from Rio Rancho, Matthew’s family has been in New Mexico since the 1600s.